Argumentation and Debate

Assignments

Major Assignments

  1. Assignment One: Story as Argument Podcast Episode or Video (750 words)

You are asked to write a 500-word script, a 300-word reflection, and produce a podcast telling a story to an audience to achieve a specific purpose that contributes to an existing conversation, debate, or societal problem. Please submit both your written script and the audio file of your podcast episode. Ideally, you should think of the three major assignments as building on each other, developing and strengthening your argument over the course of the semester. For example, you persuade us that a problem you care about exists in the first unit, your research that problem further and more deeply in the second unit, and you link to your podcast or video as part of your written web-based argument in the third unit. Your topic must come from this list of sample topics. You may choose another topic by emailing a suggested reading from the list of magazines in the handout to the professor for approval. Your reflection letter should situate your podcast episode as part of an existing popular podcast or describe how it fits into a new podcast you are launching.

2. Assignment Two: Reflective Annotated Bibliography (1500 words)

You are asked to conduct research to create a reflective annotated bibliography (RAB) to inform yourself in-depth about an issue. The RAB must include five entries and a letter synthesizing your findings. Choose two scholarly sources and two non-scholarly sources (magazine or news articles, or government reports). The scholarly sources can be a book chapter(s), an encyclopedia entry, and/or online journal article(s) found through the Baruch library website. In addition, your fifth entry must use primary research, so you’re expected to use a survey, interview, observation, or some other method of primary data collection. You’re also asked to accompany your entries with a letter synthesizing the main ideas and analyses of the sources. Please consult this student sample for what your assignment should look like. Your research topic must come from this list. Your argument in the next major assignment will be about the same topic you choose in this one. Here’s are some additional resources that might be helpful:

    1. Introduction to Primary Research
    2. The Purdue OWL on Primary Research

3. Assignment Three: Research-based Argument for Personal Website (750 words)

In this unit, you are asked to design a personal website through the Blogs@Baruch or WordPress platform that includes a blog entry with a research-based argument that meets web writing conventions. You must use your research results from Unit 2, and you are encouraged (not required) to use your story in the first unit. Your written argument must be at least 750 words. Please find here an example of what your website should look like from another Baruch student.

Mini-Assignments

  1. Live Lincoln Douglas Debate (2 Vs. 2): Following this schedule and assigned topic, you will participate in one debate at some point during the semester using the Lincoln Douglas debate format. Your classmates and I will serve as judges. They will assign scores for various categories for each team and the team with the highest total score wins the debate.
      • Detailed outline (500 words) of your team’s argument with evidence (10 sources), and sources
      • Live speeches using the Lincoln Douglas format described in this link
  2. Reading Summary Responses: Throughout the semester, you will be asked to submit summaries of assigned textbook chapters along with your reaction, analysis and response to the content of the chapters. Each entry should include a 150-word summary and a 150-word analysis, totaling 300 words. In preparation to the summary responses (due dates are in the schedule), you must actively engage in social annotations in the Perusall platform, highlighting key ideas, commenting on them, and responding to classmates’ comments. Here are some questions to consider as you read, comment, summarize, and analyze:
      • What did you learn?
      • Can you share a personal experience that supports or challenges the author’s statements.
      • Do you have other pieces of information that connect in some way to the authors claims?
      • How is what you learned related to our class, your other classes, your future job, other areas of life, and/or our major assignments?